New Drones Stream Live Travel Videos in Real Time

Adding live streaming capabilities to drone videos ups the ante for savvy travel brands looking for innovative marketing campaigns that engage travelers before and after a trip.

— Samantha Shankman

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One of the world’s largest drone manufacturers DJI yesterday revealed its new line of consumer drones featuring an upgraded 4k camera, which for the first time is capable of live streaming in near real time.

Pilots can either use the ‘Director’ feature on the app to edit the best shots from a flight into short videos that can be shared immediately after landing or use YouTube Live to stream aerial footage in real time.

“This has tremendous potential for changing the way we share experiences with one another,” DJI’s San Francisco General Manager Eric Cheng said in a statement.

Drone videos are changing the travel marketing landscape and becoming an increasingly popular option for showing a destination from a new perspective. The relatively low cost of drone equipment is democratizing aerial videos, adding them into the marketing mix. We’ve highlighted several drone videos over the past year with some of our favorites coming from Iceland, Antarctica, and Norway.

The ability to live stream videos from a destination takes the creative power of drone videos one step further.

“DJI is setting the stage for smart brands to create live insider views into international events that would otherwise require a passport and plane ticket,” says Nick Gash, founder of drone production company GE Aerials.

By mapping live videos, as is done on sites like TravelByDrone, travelers would be able to get a broad, updated sense of a place that they’d like to visit now or in the future.

It also gives destinations a way to market specific events or seasons as they happen.

“Practically every destination and major brand we work with is now asking for aerial video in the branded content we produce for them,” says Ross Borden, co-founder and CEO of the Matador Network.

The FAA is still working on a set of long-anticipated rules for the commercial unmanned aircraft, which will place limits on flight speed, altitude, and location in the U.S.